Digital Scare

Dessert Vixen Chocolate Orgasm Torte

2006-06-05T14:09:00.000-07:00

Dessert Vixen

Dessert Vixen - No Bake Cookies

2006-05-06T17:55:00.000-07:00

Enjoy the Dessert Vixen as she invites a couple of friends over for some after school baking fun making No Bake Cookies. Mmmmm!

Walk Around SBC Park

2006-02-22T10:56:00.000-08:00

The other day I went to SBC Park (formerly Pac Bell Park, soon to be AT&T Park) in San Francisco, Home of the SF Giants. Here are some of the pictures I took...

What's in a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken?

2006-02-15T18:10:00.000-08:00

New evidence suggests why Kentucky Fried Chicken changed its name to KFC (thus removing the word Chicken).

Assassinated Teknology Series

2006-01-19T09:37:00.000-08:00

I have been creating junk for quite a few years now, that I have called Assassinated Teknology, sort of an ongoing project. This has been both a process of investigating the inner workings of teknology and to celebrate the artistic and fashion options using teknologikal pieces and parts.

Hard Drive Series 5.1.A

Collages

2006-01-18T17:58:00.000-08:00

Another favorite thing to do is to create collages. I will attempt to incorporate both digital and mixed media based collages I have created over the years.

L to R: loop.for.food, san francisco gothic, stingray.

Moving out

2005-10-20T03:33:00.000-07:00

Well the excitement of moving is fading quickly into a mere memory. As I look back I will share some of the visual elements that helped to make the trip from Kalamazoo to Oakland seem like a 2,828 mile drive halfway asleep. We left Kalamazoo with a sign...

"The praying mantis has historically been a popular subject of mythology and folklore. In France, people believed a praying mantis would point a lost child home. In Arabic and Turkish cultures, a mantis was thought to point toward Mecca. In Africa, the mantis was thought to brink good luck to whomever it landed on and even restore life to the dead. In the U.S. they were thought to blind men and kill horses. Europeans believed they were highly worshipful to god since they always seemed to be praying. In China, nothing cured bedwetting better than roasted mantis eggs." -from http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/biology/b103/f02/web1/mdoughty.html

I would have to say that I agree more with the French belief than the U.S.
We looked at this as a good sign, and got things loaded into the truck and headed out.

We drove the first day (and night) and stopped in Memphis, got some good rest then headed west along I40 through the buckle of the Bible belt. Along the way we saw these things:
The Texas welcome station

The largest cross in the western hemisphere

The Bug Graveyard

A rare Arizona plastic bag flower

In Bakersfield, CA we came across a gas station that has figured it all out...

Finally we got to Oakland and the camera broke.

Playgrounds of the past; Toof-Chippers Revolt!

2005-08-23T03:33:00.000-07:00

I was devastated to find one day driving around the sprawling campus at work that some construction workers were removing a playground in a park owned by the company for use by the company. No they didn't replace it with modern super playground sets that you find all over the place. They just ripped it out. I am pretty sure there were reasonable insurance related reasons why these spring loaded implements of fun were taken out, but it is just apalling to me either way.

The playground consisted of 3 spring loaded, cast iron animals and a 4 way spring thing. It was tucked as far back as something could get in this park, under the trees and behind the pavilion.

Now I like to call all playground pieces that are hard like that and contain springs toof-chippers. and the world has 4 less toof-chippers now as a result of corporate paranoia. I can just hear the leadership team now, discussing this right now.

"Do you believe that we have iron, spring loaded playground rides in our corporate park?"
"Oh dear, what will we do if New York finds out about this?"
"We should just get rid of them. We don't need to do anything to let on that we aren't team players."
"Maybe we can work the removal into a site cost savings budget slide somehow..."
"Great idea, this will help us save millions in possible insurance claims when kids chip their teeth."

Oh please just give me a break.

Anyway, as I was out on a walk the other day I came across a playground in a public park that has a 4 way toof-chipper and a cool concrete jungle gym. I thought I would share those with you here, since you never know when the city is going to catch on that they have a possible law suit on their hands...

Black hole discovered

2005-08-22T03:33:00.000-07:00

The other day, while walking around Kalamazoo, MI on a rare sunny day, I was taking photographs with my Intel Play digital video/still camera (now available from Digital Blue). I seem to do this quite often as I am quite fond of the simply terrible resolution that this camera offers, 320x240 in "High Quality" mode.

Well as I was walking around I looked up and saw the sun and aimed the little camera at it. Now I am not an astrophysicist by any means, but if you will look closely at this picture you will see (as I have) a black hole centered right in the middle of the sun. Maybe there was just too much information for the camera to handle and it just farted out, but there is sure some sort of black colored hole looking thing right there in the middle of the old sun.

Maybe that is why the scientists tell us not to look directly at the sun, they are hiding this black hole for themselves. Either way, don't look at this picture for too long. You might start seeing things...

Assassinated Teknology Exhibited

2005-08-18T03:33:00.000-07:00

I had the opportunity, thanks to the encouragement of Spoke Nine and Elray from Potter Belmar Labs, to exhibit for the first time to the public some pieces from my Assassinated Teknology research projekt. There are 6 pieces shown here, keep reading...
Floppy Curtain

The first is the floppy curtain. Featuring 110 5.25" floppy disks suspended from a branch from a mighty maple tree, this piece represents the fine balance between teknology and nature (or something like that). Really what it shows is that you can waste a bunch of time punching holes in floppy disks, creating little metal loops to hold them together and take a branch and make a curtain out of it all. It works well as a window treatment or a fanciful room divider. The piece was also exhibited in Kalamazoo at Symmetry Hair Design in 2002. This one is a real crowd favorite.

Painted Disk Cases
The other pieces are 5 floppy and hard disk drive frames and cases, painted with acrylic paint, also featuring reflective cardboard inserts. I really wanted to show off the internal beauty of the functional design of these cases, so what better way then to paint them and hang them in an art show. There have been many requests for another set, and that is in the works. For the time being though what you see here is all that remains, as each piece pictured here has been grabbed up by hungry art patrons.

The concept for this type of art stems from an idea I had that goes something like this... " Make art out of the debris of everyday life" It is that simple.

George W. Bush on his Segway

2005-08-14T20:55:00.000-07:00

Oh where is W going to turn up next?

Take a look at what our traffic cam in this city square turned up...

more junk from the junky digital camera in Detroit

2005-08-04T15:33:00.000-07:00

Taking a walk through Dertoit is quite enjoyable as well as edumacational.

Here are a couple of science class dissected heads, brains and skeletons for you to enjoy.
Note: The Brain says "Made in China."

Another thing that you can see in the Motor City besides the blight that past and current mayors have left is the Spirit of Detroit, shown below.

This sculpture sits at the end of the Coleman A. Young gub'ment building (city hall). Isn't that nice.

Finally if you go to Detroit for the Detroit Electronic Music Festival (also known as Movement) you might run into some polices, like this nice man below - protecting the Ren Cen.

The trouble with magnetic cities

2005-08-02T15:33:00.000-07:00

On a recent trip to Toronto I noticed a strange thing. I can't get away from where I live. Let me try to explain.

I currently reside in Kalamazoo, MI and there is totally something about this part of Southwest Michigan that is magnetic. Maybe it is like this other places too, but Kalamazoo has a hard grip on those who call it home and even those who try to get away.

Well, on my trip to Toronto I was digging through a box of patches and look at what I grabbed...
Now this was really strange. What you see here is the water tower that resides over the State Psychiatric Hospital on Oakland Drive in Kalamazoo. It is also called the Virgin Tower by the college kids here since a brick falls off the tower every time a virgin graduates from Western Michigan University. Not many have, since it is still standing.

Anyway, back to the whole magnet thing...

Kalamazoo has a real grip on me since I lived here from 1989-1996 then got out and made it to San Francisco, but someone switched the magnet back on and I found myself back here in 2001.
Well I have it on good authority that the magnet is going back off. To celebrate this I am heading back to SF Bay and shielding myself.

San Francisco Jungle, Notes from the Underground

2005-07-24T23:33:00.000-07:00

From time to time I will be archiving some of my written work from a time when I lived in San Francisco, CA. The majority is based around the San Francisco Jungle scene from 1996-1999. Other pieces are simple jottings of my surroundings. These transcribed items from my many notebooks will serve to document both what was going on in in San Francisco at the time, as well as what was (or might have been) going on in my head.
These posts are now published at my San Francisco Jungle: Notes from the Underground blog.

Without any apologies, let the words start to flow.
I only hope I can read my handwriting...

Pictures taken with Intel Play Camera

2005-06-27T15:33:00.000-07:00

I picked up an Intel Play video/still digital camera that takes nice lo-rez pictures and videos.
Here are some for your enjoyment...

The first picture was taken in Detroit, in a People Mover station.

This one here needs little explanation...

And this is a self portrait taken in the Ann Arbor Urban Outfitters dressing room mirror. You can plainly see how silly I look taking pictures with this digital toy.

Intel sold the division to Digital Blue who don't seem to support the old Intel products, but at least they still make the thing, which is a lot more than I can say for Fisher Price. I am still mad that they gave up on the Pixel Vision PXL2000.

pr3tard-gmail

2005-06-15T09:43:00.000-07:00

pr3tard-gmail, originally uploaded by teknikalassassin.

PR3TARD is currently in the studio creating a new volume of noise for your listening pleasure (or pain).

chipcollage

2005-05-23T20:45:00.000-07:00

chipcollage, originally uploaded by teknikalassassin.

Digital photo collage of a chip that was removed from a computer. The chip is now a magnet on my fridge.

cdlaser

2005-05-23T20:44:00.000-07:00

cdlaser, originally uploaded by teknikalassassin.

Laser taken from a CDROM. A Ball chain is used to wear it as a fashionable pendant.

harddisk

2005-05-23T20:43:00.000-07:00

harddisk, originally uploaded by teknikalassassin.

Dismantled hard disk drive that features a platter to practice turntable moves. Notice the reflection. Captured into an Apple 7100 through the component video in card.

nanotron

2005-05-18T18:48:00.000-07:00

nanotron, originally uploaded by teknikalassassin.

A nice portrait of my favorite computer. Named Nanotron, this Powerbook 170 packs an impressive 25MHz processor and is packed full with 8 MB of RAM. It does have a FPU for some real processing power. Used to create Street Jungle performances on the streets of San Francisco by Teknikal Assassin from 1997-1999. This beotch is still kicking.